Understanding color schemes

Citera uses color schemes — Shopify’s system for grouping related colors (background, text, buttons, borders) into named sets. Every section picks a scheme; edit a scheme once, and it applies everywhere it’s used.

This is why your store stays visually consistent even as you build page after page: instead of picking a background color every time, you pick a scheme.

The default schemes

Citera ships with these schemes (names may differ slightly depending on which theme style you started with):

Scheme	Typical use
Background 1	Default page background — usually light
Background 2	Alternate band for zebra-striping down a page
Inverse	Dark band (dark background, light text)
Accent 1	Brand accent — buttons, highlights
Accent 2	Secondary accent — sale tags, badges

How to switch a section’s scheme

Open the section in the theme editor

Click any section in the left panel.

Find the Color scheme setting

Scroll the right panel — every section has a Color scheme dropdown, usually near the top.

Pick a different scheme

Choose from the dropdown. The preview updates immediately.

How to edit a scheme

Edit a scheme once and every section using it updates.

Open theme settings

In the theme editor, click the gear icon in the bottom-left to open Theme settings.

Go to Colors

Click Colors. You’ll see the list of schemes.

Edit any scheme

Click a scheme to expand it. You can change:

Background — the section’s background
Background gradient — optional overlay gradient
Text — main text color
Heading — heading color, if you want it different from body text
Link — hyperlink color
Solid button background and text — the “primary” button style
Outline button — the “secondary” button style

Save

Click Save at the top-right.

Best practices

Keep contrast high. For readability and accessibility, aim for at least 4.5:1 contrast between text and background.
Use only 2–3 schemes across your site. Cycling through many schemes makes the store look busy. Most well-designed stores use a light default, a dark band for emphasis, and one accent scheme.
The dark band trick. Use the Inverse scheme on 1–2 sections per page (like a testimonials block or a promo band) for visual variation without chaos.

Section-level color schemes replace old “background color” settings. If you’re migrating from an older Shopify theme, you may look for “background color” per section. In Citera, everything routes through the scheme system.

Colors — the full palette reference
Theme styles — pre-built scheme sets